


The Abrupt Disappearance of the Ponds

by Origamidragons



Series: Buzzfeed Unsolved: Fiction Edition [7]
Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series), Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Episode: s07e05 The Angels Take Manhattan, Gen, Humor, POV Outsider, Social Media, YouTube
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-23
Updated: 2019-04-23
Packaged: 2020-01-24 12:33:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18571606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Origamidragons/pseuds/Origamidragons
Summary: “This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved we’re discussing the Pond disappearance, one of the most high-profile disappearance cases in recent British history.”





	The Abrupt Disappearance of the Ponds

**Buzzfeed Unsolved - True Crime** S5 • E5  
_The Abrupt Disappearance of the Ponds_

The episode began as it always did- with the sound of shattering glass, a siren screaming in the distance, as a swinging lightbulb illuminated the name of the show: _Buzzfeed Unsolved_.

“This week on Buzzfeed Unsolved we’re discussing one of the most high-profile disappearance cases in recent British history.”

“Going ‘cross the pond, ah we, guv’nah?” Shane asked in a bad parody of a British accent. “Gonna ‘ave a little pip pip cheerio?”

Ryan stared at him for a moment. Shane smiled back, unperturbed.

“Are you done?”

“For now,” Shane said. “No promises.”

Ryan, conscious that this was the best deal he was likely to get, conceded and turned back to the camera. “Today we’re covering the Pond disappearance of 2012. Like many of the cases we cover, this case was subject to explosive media coverage and conspiracy theories-”

“Oh, awesome,” Shane said unenthusiastically.

“-as a result of the victims’ identities. As such, we’ll start with talking about who they were and just why their disappearances caused such an uproar.”

As Ryan settled into his ‘narrator’ voice, the screen faded to black, and a brightly colored image, clearly a magazine cover from a fashion shoot of some sort, appeared on the screen. The title story read ‘Amelia Pond: The new face of the UK’s fashion scene.’

“In September of 2012, twenty-three year old Amelia Pond was the single fastest-rising new star in the British fashion industry. She had featured on the covers of Dazed, GQ, i-D and Pop-”

_these are words, you’re literally just saying words_

_they’re fashion magazines_   
_british fashion magazines_

_ive never heard of any of these_   
_i think you made these up_

_not my fault you have no class_

“-and was in the midst of an advertising campaign with Chanel. She was happily married to her husband of two years, Rory Williams, and by all accounts from family and friends the two were perfectly content, if slightly eccentric. Then-”

_whoa whoa whoa_   
_you cant just drop ‘eccentric’ with no explanation and then move on_   
_if there’s one thing doing this show has taught me its that you can’t trust eccentrics!_   
_theyre always the murderers!_

_(wheeze)_

“At approximately 8:30 AM on the 29th of September, the Ponds left their London home for what they claimed was a brief vacation to New York to see Central Park and several other landmarks after the summer tourist season was over. No plane tickets were ever purchased under either of their names, and customs had no records of them ever arriving in America.”

“They were never seen again. Despite a media frenzy and a thorough manhunt throughout London, neither they nor their bodies were ever found.”

_what, that’s it? that’s the crime?_   
_that’s so ANTICLIMACTIC!_   
_where’s the drama? the scandal?_

_oh, we-we’ll get to that_

“With the basics of the crime itself covered, let’s get into the theories,” Ryan said, as the words Theory #1 flickered on the screen in typewriter font.

“Our first theory is that Amelia and her husband were murdered by a crazed fan of Amelia’s. Stalkers are an unfortunately common threat for models, and a subpoena during the investigation turned up several love letters mailed to her agency over the course of her career. Lawyers for the agency said that Mrs. Pond was made aware of the letters, but was reportedly unconcerned about them, saying, quote, ‘If they want to try, we’ll see how romantic they feel after a couple good whacks with a baseball bat.’”

_(wheeze)_   
_i love it_

“The most worrisome of these letters was traced to an Edgar Walker, British fan who at the time of the disappearance lived only four and a half miles away from the Pond-Williams home. Authorities questioned him for some time, but ultimately had no evidence to connect him to the crime, and investigators said that his shock and grief appeared genuine.”

_that’s- so that’s obviously not good evidence, yknow_

_yup_

_like “oh well he seemed really sad about it so he must be innocent”_   
_obviously if someone committed a double murder, they’re not in their right minds_   
_you can’t really trust their reactions_

_crazy is as crazy does_

_(wheeze)_   
_yeah, crazy is as crazy does_

“Police spent some time investigating this lead as their primary theory, and ran down all of the letters that the agency had received, but all of them were ultimately dead ends. By the time they were finished investigating the letter avenue, the disappearance was several weeks old.”

_so they wasted a lot of time on this lead_   
_which to be fair, it is a solid theory_   
_it just wound up turning up empty_

“Our second theory is that Amelia Pond herself was responsible for the deaths of herself and her husband, in a murder-suicide scenario.”

_oh SNAP_

“This theory was first published and popularized by a small, independent British news outlet known as Fifth Estate. This paper had uncovered Amelia’s medical history, which indicated she had frequently seen therapists for delusional tendencies from 1996, when she was just seven years old, all the way into her adulthood.”

_does it say what the delusions are?_

_no, just mentions of ‘overactive imagination’_

“In a 2014 article titled ‘The Uncovered Truth about Amy Pond,’ a writer for Fifth Estate suggested that the issues that prompted these visits may have been a sign of undiagnosed schizophrenia, which could have later manifested in more severe delusions and possibly even violent tendencies later in life. It’s worth noting that this isn’t entirely ungrounded, as an earlier tabloid article citing anonymous sources within the Pond family had reported a breakdown by Amelia at her 2010 wedding.”

“However, Amelia had displayed no aberrations in behavior in the months before her disappearance, and this still would leave the glaring question of what happened to the bodies. If it were true that Amelia Pond killed her husband and herself in a fit of mania, the bodies certainly would have been found.”

_yeah, i, uh, i think this one is, as the british say, "a-full a’ shit"_

_that’s not a british accent_   
_i actually don’t think that’s an anywhere accent_

“It’s also worth noting that after the article was published, Fifth Estate was later sued for libel and breach of private medical information by the bereaved Pond parents, and settled out of court for an undisclosed sum.”

_oh, well, that’s that then_

“Rory Williams’s father, Brian Williams, was vehemently opposed to this theory. I’m going to play a clip of an interview with him now from shortly after the article was published.”

The audio switched to a slightly crackly clip of an elderly man with a British accent. He sounded furious.

“ _They don’t know what they’re talking about! Do anything for a quid, those buggers would. Amy was a good girl. Couldn’t have asked for a better daughter-in-law. She looked after my boy. And Rory loved her fierce. Ever since he was a littlun I’d be hearing about Amy this and Amy that. They were always gonna get married, you know, I could feel it. She never would’ve hurt him. And he never would’ve hurt her._ ”

_so i think it’s safe to say_   
_this one is pretty thoroughly debunked_

_yeah, i’m thinkin that too_   
_this myth is busted_

“Our third theory is that there was no murder, and instead the deaths were a result of an accident at sea. The Ponds said that they were going to America, but no plane tickets were ever purchased under their names, so it’s possible they were intending to take a slower and more luxurious sea route aboard a smaller vessel.”

_ohhhhhh, sit right back and you’ll hear a tale-_

_no, dont_

_a tale of a fateful trip-_

_goddammit_   
_i knew you would do this_

_that started on this tropic board, aboard this tiny ship_   
_the mate was a mighty sailin’ man, the skipper brave and true_   
_five passengers set sail that day for a three hour tour_   
_a three hour tooooouuuur_

“Any number of things could have happened to the Ponds at sea- the boat could have suffered difficulties in the mid-Atlantic and sank, or they could have been killed by the skipper for their money or luggage. However, this theory meets the same wall as the idea of them taking a plane does. Chartering a boat, regardless of size, would almost certainly leave a paper trail of some sort, but none was ever found, nor were any small vessels reported missing.”

_so they never left london_   
_or if they did they did it without spending any money_

_that is how it would seem, isn’t it_

_...i don’t like that tone_   
_that’s the ‘incoming bullshit’ tone_   
_alright, lay it on me_   
_..._   
_don’t rub your fucking hands together like that_   
_it’s creepy_

“Our fourth and final theory is that the Ponds vanished due to extraterrestrial interference.”

The camera cut back to the boys just in time for Shane to slam his head down on the table, before switching back to the narration.

“We’ve established the Ponds didn’t take a plane, and it seems unlikely they took a boat, either. Despite this, they were seen by multiple witnesses in New York City on the 29th, the day of their disappearance. Not only that, two of these witnesses reported seeing them in Central Park a mere two hours after their departure from London, which would mean a travel time unobtainable even by the fastest commercial jets.”

_wh- well, then it’s impossible! you just said it’s impossible!!_

_they’re eyewitness accounts_   
_more than one, all agreeing on locations and-_

_but she was like, super famous, right?_   
_let me, let me paint you a word picture, ryan_   
_“whoa, amelia pond disappeared, and she said she was going to new york?? i live in new york!”_   
_“what day? the 29th? yeah, now that you mention it, i saw a redhead in central park that day, you think it could’ve been her? golly gee i’ve solved the mystery!”_

_okay- okay- okay_   
_i take your point_   
_but, listen to this next part_

“These included a photograph, taken by one fan, of Amelia and Rory near New York City's Winter Quay. The picture was turned over to British police for use in the investigation, and verified as genuine. Which would confirm that the Ponds were indeed in New York on the day they disappeared. Both the seemingly-impossible travel time and their subsequent complete disappearance could be explained by alien interference.”

_okay, even if, even if they were maybe in new york somehow_   
_that doesn’t mean aliens!_

_it has been documented that amelia vocally believed in the existence of aliens_

_so?? you believe in ghosts and none of them have kidnapped you yet!_

_you’d like that, wouldn’t you_

_you know, ryan, at times like this i would_

“In the end, it seems likely we’ll never know what really happened to Amelia Pond and Rory Williams on that fateful September day. Whether it was an obsessed fan, a tragic maritime accident, or something else entirely, the case remains… unsolved.”

**Author's Note:**

> Oh my god it’s been so long! I’m sorry! I got really into BNHA, and then Jojo’s, and... yeah. I definitely haven’t abandoned this series, though! I have quite the list of episodes to do- so if you’ve requested one in the comments, believe me, it is on the list! The list is just... long. At current count there’s 22 potential episodes I want to write. 
> 
> Shout-out to Daughter_of_the_TARDIS for this idea in particular, since I was planning on doing a Doctor Who episode but kept hitting a brick wall when it came to how to handle it. (There’s SO MUCH LORE YOU GUYS? It was like the problems with the SPN episode but up to eleven.) I really enjoyed writing this one and it was a good way to get back into working on this series!
> 
> (We’ve also covered ⅔ of the unholy Superwholock triumvirate now, so stay tuned for a Sherlock’s Fall episode maybe at some point in the future?)
> 
> I promise I won’t make you guys wait six months for the next one.


End file.
